Afternoon Briefs on the Los Angeles Political Machine for Monday

The Joe Buscaino Campaign is claiming that an internal poll of absentee voters, shows Buscaino getting 40% plus of the early vote. this number is plausible considering 63 % of the early votes are from his San Pedro stronghold. Meanwhile, the City Maven took the time to compile the latest financial data which shows money galore, as we enter the last week before election day on November 8.

The Roosevelt High School parent group of the Southern California Ya Basta Committee are garnering attention in their quest to oust Mayor Antonio Villar's "Partnership with Los Angeles Schools" from the Boyle heights campus. As the LA Weekly reports, test scores don't lie. And there's more. Academic Performance Index scores (at least at the two small schools we can find them for) are similarly dismal: between 500 and 575. Those make Compton Unified look like district of the freaking month. And embarrassingly, the Los Angeles Times recently discovered that the rest of the mayor's precious Partnership schools arealso doing worse than untouched district-run schools.

You'd think, with the amount of time Villaraigosa spends on campus, some progress might have been made. But that's the problem with Sir Vanishing Veracity -- he's great at flashing pearly whites and shaking constituent hands and Tweeting about it, but when it comes to nitty-gritty policy and pedagogy, he hasn't got a clue. And instead of appointing underlings who do, he keeps it in the family with more flimsy, substance-less pols in training.

Los Angeles Wave Newspaper Columnist Betty Pleasant has the scoop on a District Attorney Candidate forum on Wednesday. THIS AND THAT — A Los Angeles County District Attorney candidates forum will be held next Wednesday from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Japanese American National Museum, 369 E. First St. It is sponsored by the Asian Pacific American Bar Association of L.A. County and co-sponsored by 12 other multi-racial organizations. In addition to Deputy D.A. Danette Meyers, the forum will feature the other candidates seeking to replace the beast D.A. Steve Cooley — Deputy DAs Bobby Grace, Steve Ipsen,Alan Jackson, Mario Trujillo and, oh, Jackie Lacey. The event is free and you’re asked to RSVP by Halloween to contactapaba@gmail.com (subject line: “DA Forum”). I wouldn’t miss it for the world!